February frolics

[Bierzo Baggie]

Went out on Saturday night, which inevitably wiped out Sunday morning. Was quite impressed by a recent post by Sweder where he was able to go to a barn dance, gulp down 6 pints and run 14 miles the next morning. Since joining the 30-something club Saturday nights and Sunday mornings have become for me more or less incompatible.

Anyway, bumped into Pedro the lumberjack who was out and about and we talked about the coming fell running season. Three big dates. In May, there’s the Truchillas-Vizcodillo fell race. 16kms, straight up- straight down with a lake strategically placed half way to cool off if it’s hot. Pedro won the over 40s race last year and his prize was a rather large leg of pork.
In June is my favourite, The Aquilianos Challenge. This covers the entire range of the now snow-capped mountains visible from Ponferrada. There are two possible routes and you have between 6am to 10pm to finish, so there’s no hurry. The catch is that the short route is 45km and the long route a whopping 65km with three 2000m plus peaks thrown in for good measure. This might seem excessive and there is an element of unhealthy competition amongst the front-runners but for 80% of us it’s a walking event.
Finally in September there is the maddest of them all. It’s organized by a local rock climber in Villamanín near León…so you know what to expect. Went with Pedro last year and it was probably the most spectacular run I’ve done…ever. It’s also the closest I’ve come to finishing last (there were only three other finishers behind me).

So, with a fat Sunday morning zero to finish the week my accumulated training reads as followed….
Week Two.
Feb 14th to Feb 20th
Runs 4 (approx 30kms in total).
5-a-side match (lost 8-1…again).